In this thesis, I targeted the orchid genus Lepanthes, one of the six genera of angiosperms that surpasses 1,000 species in the Neotropics, as a study model to investigate the evolutionary processes that promoted species diversifications.

As part of the NEXUS1492 project, this project will use ancient DNA techniques to shed new light on the demographic and health history of the Caribbean and the impact of European colonization on indigenous communities in the region.

The emissions of the Chinese industrial sector alone comprise 24.1% of global emissions (7.8 GtCyr−1 in 2015). This makes Chinese industrial emissions of unique national and international relevance in climate policy. This study reports a literature survey that quantitatively describes the evolution…

The aim of the project is to contribute to the process of archive formation ongoing in Post-Apartheid South Africa through the inclusion of photographs that have been either unacknowledged or excised from the national canon.

We have decided to cancel the Summer School for Historical Acting due to the ongoing global public health crisis.

Using the motto 'Exploring humanities through the life of objects' the Thingsthattalk platform gives a voice to historical objects that are usually kept behind closed doors. Objects from various Leiden collections are going to be made public and placed within a historical and user context.

This Spring School will pay attention to a wide range of performances in history, from political gatherings, religious rituals, and courtroom proceedings to theatre, concerts, and dance. It combines a focus on the medieval and early modern period with an interdisciplinary perspective, attending to the…

This book offers a clear and accessible exposition of Hayden White’s thought. In an engaging and wide-ranging analysis, Herman Paul discusses White’s core ideas and traces the development of these ideas from the mid-1950s to the present.

The aim of the project is to unravel the genetic and contact relations between the indigenous languages of Mesoamerica (Mexico and western Central America) and the Middle Andes region (Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia), as part of a larger endeavor to understand the historical process of the peopling of the Americas…

Linguistic research on a unique collection of Dutch letters allowed us to gain access to the every-day language of people from various walks of life. Private letters by men, women and even children have been elaborately explored in the Letters as Loot researchprogramme, initiated and directed by prof.…

Leiden University and the University of Amsterdam, together with Heritage Leiden and Region, are developing a map application of historical Leiden.

Matthew Broad elected a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society

As of 1 July, Gijsbert Rutten is Professor by special appointment of Historical Sociolinguistics of Dutch at Leiden University. Rutten, who also works as Director of Education at the Leiden University Centre for Linguistics (LUCL), will, among other things, research the historical relationship between…

Thijs Porck, university lecturer of medieval English at the Leiden University Centre for the Arts in Society, has been elected a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society (RHS).

The Leiden municipality wants to make the city centre climate-proof and combat heat stress by greening it. But they want to do this in a way that does justice to the city’s heritage. Researcher Fenna IJtsma delves into historical greenery to offer inspiration.

Directors of museums in the Netherlands announced in March 2019 that they would be taking new steps in relation to the return of looted colonial artefacts. So what has happened since?

Alumnus Ruurt Hazewinkel (90) has presented Leiden University with a special gift: a historic house on Leiden’s Rapenburg canal. He handed over the key to Rector Carel Stolker on Monday 25 January.

Students taking the new bachelor’s course ‘Social Movements and Political Violence’ are about to do something new. In addition to studying textbooks and academic articles, they will actively work with multimedia materials and engage in online storytelling. Course instructor Corinna Jentzsch (Leiden…

MIDDELBURG/GENEVA – The president of the United Nations Human Rights Council has invited the Zeeland Archives from the Netherlands, to Geneva on March 20th in order to present its project about the historical slave voyage aboard The Unity (1761-1763).

The question of land property titles is a common source of conflict between indigenous communities and federal authorities all over the Americas. A new Panamanian law have led indigenous communities to reach out to archaeologist Dr Natalia Donner. A grant from the Centre for Indigenous American Studies…

Migration is not only reflected in DNA, but also in language. By tracing changes in language, we learn more about the lifestyle of the people that speak it. University lecturer Tijmen Pronk (40) conducts linguistic research into (pre)historical migration.

Research into our history of colonialism and slavery, heart-to-heart conversations at a Keti Koti table, exhibitions, lectures and podcasts that establish the link between present and past. Staff and students participated in the national Slavery Memorial Year in many different ways. What have we learned…

Theft, prostitution, fortune-telling or murder. Historian Manon van der Heijden and a group of students are researching court records from The Hague from 1600 to 1800. They are tracing crimes and offenders and shedding new light on The Hague’s Gevangenpoort (or Prison Gate). Among their many discoveries…

Fokelien Kootstra defended her thesis on 23 April 2019

Dutch people are far more law-abiding than they might like to think. And they are very different from the Belgians in that regard. The different approaches of the two governments towards the coronavirus crisis, for example, can be explained from the history of both countries since the Middle Ages. Historians…

What do you do when you’re suddenly given access to a whole lot of data but don’t know how to organise and analyse it? Maritime historians in the Faculty of Humanities joined forces with vocational college (MBO) students to build a database. ‘We’re so compatible with each other.’

The Dutch prefix ge- in historical perspective gives first of all a general account of the development of the word formation processes involving ge- in which special attention is paid to the participial ge-.

The project Going Dutch investigates why the link between being or becoming Dutch, and knowledge of Standard Dutch is so often taken for granted in public discourse, by diving into its historical roots.

Understanding the nature, characteristics and function of the secular vocal intabulations and dances found in Italian printed keyboard sources in the 16th century

At the recent Historical Keyboard Society of North America Conference which took place from 22-26 June in Hunter New York, Kathryn Cok, Phd was nominated and elected to the position of Vice-President from July 1st by distinguished American and international colleagues.

Which plants are depicted, described or collected in these century-old objects? Who made these objects, where and for what purpose? What is their scientific and societal relevance today?

The largest international conference on English historical linguistics is coming to Leiden. From 7 June to 11 June 2021, the Leiden University Centre for Linguistics (LUCL) organises the International Conference on English Historical Linguistics (ICEHL-21). Due to Covid measures, the conference takes…

From September 2024, the existing departments of History and Medieval Studies will join forces and launch CEU’s new Department of Historical Studies. Our research and teaching are recognized for their innovative approach to graduate education, and our international faculty offers expertise that extends…

An article by Janice McNab, post -doc researcher with ACPA, has been published by Religious Studies Review, Rice University. Title: Hilma af Klint and the Need for Historical Revision.

The Organ Art of the first female German concert organist and Bremen Cathedral organist and

What did plays look like in the seventeenth, eighteenth or nineteenth centuries? With the new OverActing theatre festival, university lecturer Jed Wentz is trying to get closer to an answer to that question.

The underwater world around present-day Indonesia has changed greatly in recent centuries as a result of human activity. University lecturer Johannes Müller has been awarded an NWO XS grant to map the history of the Indonesian ecosystems.

In a speech on Keti Koti the Dutch king, Willem-Alexander, apologised on behalf of the royal family for the Netherlands’ historical role in slavery. What is the significance of this?

The opening and inauguration of the Visitors Centre, and the visitors trail on the site, are an important result of the Tell Balata Archaeological Park project that is jointly being implemented by the Palestinian Department of Antiquities and Cultural Heritage, the Faculty of Archaeology of the University…